Spin Cycle
by Elizabeth1
Summary: Michael does his laundry


Title: Spin Cycle  
Author: Elizabeth  
E-mail: uhmidont@theglobe.com  
Summary: Future fic. Michael does his laundry.  
Rating: PG  
Disclaimer: I would never claim the Granolith as my own. Jason Katims et al can have it.   
Distribution: Please ask.  
October 25, 2000  
  
  
The past unfolds slowly, falling up to meet him as he walks down the street. Today's memory is a familiar one and its edges are worn now; he can't remember if it was sunny or cloudy, day or night. He can't remember the color of the door of her mother's house, or if she was wearing shoes.   
  
But she's still waiting for him, back behind his mind's eye, and he goes to her.  
  
She's inside her mother's house, standing by the door. She hasn't opened it all the way, and all he can see is one eye, her nose, the curve of her chin. She shoves her hair back behind her ear with one hand and stares at him.  
  
Please, he wants to say to her. *Please*.  
  
Instead he says, "Come with me."   
  
She stands inside her mother's house and a small frown twists her mouth downward, gently. "If you had to chose" she says, her voice as quiet as he's ever heard it, "What would you pick? Me or..." She points up at the sky. "If I come with you, would you leave me if you could?"  
  
When did it get so cold? He should have grabbed a jacket, but he didn't think of it. He just figured that eventually there'd be a way to return; a way to come back and act as if everything has been another moment in a series of forgettable instances. But now he's starting to realize that this time might be different.   
  
He wants to take her hands and tell her that he's been stupid, that what he's always wanted is right in front of him, that he is who he is not because of what he is, but because of who he has become. That she has helped make him. That everything he knows about love he's learned from her.   
  
"I don't know. Come with me?" Please, he wants to say to her. *Please*. Let me love you as best as I can. Let that be enough for you.   
  
She stands inside her mother's house and shakes her head slowly. "I can't. Look at me. I'm actually thinking about it. I know that you'd leave in a second if you could, and yet I'm actually thinking about coming with you." She pauses, and he watches her take a deep breath, a sharp shuddering effort. "Do you remember what you once said to me? Do you Michael?"  
  
He shakes his head. Her sudden conversation shifts shouldn't be a surprise to him anymore, but they always are. Her inability to express herself without emphasis and questions shouldn't surprise him either. But it always did.  
  
"Maybe because I love you too much. Goodbye." She says the words without much inflection and at first he thinks she is mocking him. But he looks at her and can see that she is trying not to cry.  
  
He can't remember if she shut the door then, or if she stood there and watched him walk away. He can't remember who left who first.   
  
He can't remember if he ever told her that he loved her, he can't remember if he ever offered three words to her without conditions or strings or a half-assed and not meant farewell attached to them.  
  
He can't remember if she ever offered those three words to him.  
  
**  
  
Today, any day.  
  
Another endless sea of brown dirt and sand--if it were raining everything would be coated in mud. Mud. He should have known, back then, that trying to forget her by remembering words that began with the same letter as her name was not really trying to forget at all. It was just remembering in a way he thought he could handle.  
  
It isn't raining today and he's glad. This morning he stopped by a mini-mart and got a cup of coffee. He doesn't ever go to diners or cafes. Not ever, not anymore. Not because of her, though.   
  
Not entirely, anyway.  
  
He hopes it never rains again, hopes that all of this--dirt, sand, whatever--grows and grows and takes everything over. He hopes that this small town he's in--Matambi, Manami; he can't remember its name--is nothing but memory if he ever circles back.   
  
Not that he has anything against this particular town. Oh no. Hate is too much work. Too much effort. Dislike is about all he can muster and even that is half-hearted at best.   
  
He can not care with the best of them.  
  
Right?  
  
His memories prod at him; a little nudge, a little plea. He ignores them.  
  
Right.  
  
Right is the only answer he's willing to give. It has been for a long time.  
  
**  
  
He's been through a lot of towns over the years. At first, he ran far and wide, circling around and around the desert in ever shrinking circles. He finally gave in to his destiny and shrank the circles more. Now he just travels from one southwestern state to the other, sticking to small towns that aren't too small, places he can drift through without anyone seeing him.  
  
Today...today he has to wash his clothes.  
  
He doesn't like doing it, but it's a necessity. Dirty clothes mark you--people notice you, remember you. Might tell the pleasant-looking woman (or sometimes man) that asks about you, says that you really need to be found because of "pressing family concerns," all about you.  
  
He walks into the laundromat.  
  
He's familiar with them now; is familiar with their smell, with the peculiar set of rules that people follow when they are in them. You can't save more than two machines. You can only take someone's wet clothes out of the washer if they've been there for more than an hour. Don't ever clean out the lint screen unless the buzzer goes off.   
  
He knows that every laundromat always has a vending machine with soap, a change machine to give you quarters, and a row of several usually plastic and always uncomfortable chairs. Today's chairs are a sickly green color. He puts his bag down on top of the washing machine and digs around in his pockets for change.  
  
It now costs two dollars to wash a load of laundry. The cost has risen, not a lot, but steadily, over the years. He has six quarters. He still needs two more.  
  
He looks over at the change machine. It's old and dusty and its sides are held together with duct tape and a padlock. All he'd need to do is hold the lock in his hand for a second, maybe two. And then he'd have enough money to do his laundry for weeks. Maybe he could even buy a newspaper once in a while.   
  
*Michael, you can't do that*.  
  
After all these years, his conscience still sounds like Max. He can't even remember what Max's voice sounded like, not really, but he just knows that the little voice in his mind is all that he has left of the boy who was supposed to save him.   
  
He tells the voice to shove it, but doesn't break open the machine. Instead he checks his pockets again and sure enough, produces another two quarters.  
  
If Isabel was here...  
  
What? He asks himself. If she was here, then what? What could she possibly say, Michael? What could she possibly make you feel?   
  
He opens the washing machine and dumps his clothes in. Soap costs another seventy-five cents and he uses his powers to shake the vending machine till packets of it drop down and spill out onto the floor, a plethora of snowy white powder that looks a little like bits of shed skin.  
  
There's an old man sitting over in a corner, his head resting against the wall, his body curved sideways on one of the green chairs. The man opens one eye and regards him sleepily. Michael wonders if he is looking at his future. He wonders what the man sees when he looks at him.   
  
He grabs a package of soap and dumps it in the washer. It starts to spin and churn and he stands there, wishing he had somewhere to go and knowing he doesn't.  
  
**  
  
"Are you ready?"  
  
He turned to look at Isabel and watched as she lifted her hand up, smoothed her hair back behind her ears. He almost winced at the gesture but forced himself not to. Her hair fell forward again almost immediately anyway, a curtain descending on her features.   
  
"Yeah."  
  
She sighed and started the car and they drove out of Roswell in silence. He noticed that her knuckles were white with strain, that her fingers were clenched around the steering wheel, but still couldn't think of anything to say. He watched the desert slide by them instead.  
  
After a while, she spoke. "Did you see her?"  
  
He nodded and then realized she wasn't looking at him. "Yeah."  
  
She did turn to look at him and in her eyes there was the familiar mixture of pity and love and maybe even a little jealousy. "She said no?"  
  
He shrugged and ran a finger along the dashboard, gathering up dust.   
  
"I didn't ask Alex because he would have said yes."   
  
The words sat between them for a long time. Finally, he reached out and put an arm around her, his fingers resting on top of her shoulders. They were stiff with tension and he wondered what was worse. To be left or to be the one that does the leaving?  
  
He rolled down the window a little and let his other hand trail out, watching the sun flow across his fingers.   
  
**  
  
It was March when he called her.  
  
He was tired and hungry and had just left work. He spent nights watching the silent halls of an office building. He'd had the job for two months and he knew they'd have to leave soon. Other people in the building were starting to remember his name, greeting him with a "Hey, Ted" as they left, in a hurry to get home to their families after working late.   
  
He'd even talked to his co-worker a few times. Hank always worked nights too. Hank had two kids, a third on the way, and a house that needed a new roof. Once Michael almost told Hank that he'd known another Hank, a long time ago, and that he'd always thought the name would make him want to wince in remembered pain and fear. He thought that maybe he'd thank Hank for making him see that a name was just that--a name.  
  
The worst part of running was how easy it was to slip up, how easy it was to forget and drop a hint about the past, give someone a little piece of yourself that they could hand off to others without knowing.   
  
He passed the pay phone every day as he walked home but hadn't really thought about using it before. He could still remember if she was wearing shoes and what time of the day it was then and he thought it was enough.  
  
But beneath it all he still thought that maybe, that one day, that perhaps....  
  
The operator was happy to look up the number and they both listened to the phone ring in her mother's house.  
  
"Hello?"  
  
He started to ask for her but was cut off by the operator's voice. "Collect call for Maria DeLuca from Michael. Will you accept the charges?"  
  
There was a pause and he let himself remember how much he'd wanted her with him. How quickly he would have left her if he could.  
  
"DeLuca?" the voice said and Michael realized he didn't know it at all. "Never heard of her. Wrong number." Click.  
  
He walked home after that, hunching his shoulders against the cold start of spring.  
  
**  
  
A Tuesday in a small town on the East Coast in the middle of winter.   
  
They'd been tracked--they'd been careless once too often, had maybe stayed too long in one place or talked to someone who knew someone, or maybe it was just all bad, bad luck. He couldn't decide afterwards and he still can't.  
  
They were leaving the supermarket. Isabel was tired--she'd worked a double shift the day before and she'd woken up that morning with a headache. Her headaches left her white-faced and weeping. Michael knew that Max could have helped her, fixed her, made her well. He bought her cups of coffee and sat with her when she cried because that's all he could do. Sometimes her tears would soak the front of his shirt and he would shiver because he was so cold.  
  
A woman passed them as they were walking to their car. As she did, she reached up and touched Isabel, placing a hand on her shoulder delicately, as if it she'd slipped on a patch of ice and was only trying to steady herself.   
  
Isabel had turned her hair black--Michael had watched her pass a hand over the strands, had watched them darken and turn--but the woman's touch changed it back. She fell, landing on the frozen surface of the parking lot, and her hair slowly turned back to the bright golden color it had always been. She glowed as she died, the most beautiful girl in the world to ever die in a parking lot in January in Delaware. The woman reached for Michael as he stood, shivering over Isabel, watching her mouth move, wondering what she wanted to tell him. Wondering if she had anything left to tell him.  
  
He pulled back out of the woman's reach and ran. He left the groceries behind. As he ran, he looked back to see Isabel, saw the last shuddering breath she took. He looked back to see the most beautiful girl in the world lying on asphalt, her blond hair spread out around her like a halo.  
  
He looked back and saw a girl that he'd loved. Maybe too much once, he'd always thought.  
  
Maybe, he'd though that night, maybe never quite enough.   
  
Maybe never quite right.  
  
**   
  
The washing machine is finished. Now he has to put his clothes in the dryer. He digs in his pockets for more money, then remembers that they are empty.  
  
He looks over at the old man, who is still asleep. And then he walks over to the change machine, places his hand over the ancient lock. As he does so, his gaze automatically turns towards the window, making sure no one notices him or what he's doing.  
  
And then he sees her walking by, an echo made real.  
  
He leaves the laundromat and goes outside  
  
She is walking down the street as if she doesn't have a care in the world.  
  
"Maria?" He says it again, louder. "Maria."  
  
She turns towards him.  
  
Still the same blond curls, the ends folding in on themselves.   
  
Except not quite as shiny as he remembers.  
  
Still the same glossy mouth, turned up in what could be a smile.   
  
Except not quite as soft looking, not quite as full.  
  
Still the same eyes, full of sparkle and life and energy. He always felt so dead inside when he looked at her. He always wanted to be as alive as she was.   
  
Except her eyes aren't green.  
  
And they don't know him at all.   
  
And Maria wouldn't look like this now if he saw her. He wonders if he'd even recognize her.   
  
"I'm sorry," the girl says. "Do I know you?"   
  
Maria. But not Maria. Just someone that looks a little like her, someone that could be an imitation of the girl of his memory. If he was younger and less afraid and less tired and less human he might smile at her, pull her into his orbit and sink into her, forget for a while.  
  
He shakes his head at her instead and goes back inside the laundromat. He hears the girl walk on outside, his presence already a rapidly fading memory to her.   
  
He throws his clothes in the dryer and breaks open the lock on the change machine. He takes only the money he needs and puts the rest back, melts the lock back into place. *Happy?* he asks the Max-voice in his mind.   
  
There isn't a reply. Across from him, the old man snores a little, softly.  
  
He sits down on a chair and watches his clothes. Through the glass door of the dryer he can see them turning and turning. He cracks his knuckles and wonders if he'll ever be warm again.  
  
END  



End file.
